Nephilim Bolt Thrower

Nephilim stand apart from other warbeasts of Everblight’s legion in their ability to wield weapons while maintaining all the advantages of beasts born of the dragon’s blood. Their draconic strength allows nephilim bolt throwers to use artillery-style ballistae as hand-held weapons. Each bolt delivers tremendous stopping power against approaching foes before the bolt throwers carve up survivors with their heavy bow blades.

Basic Info

Abilities

• Template:Warbeast
• Template:Eyeless Sight
• Template:Quick Work

Weapons

• Ballista - 10" range, POW 14 ranged attack.
  • Template:Thunderbolt
• Bow Blade - 1" reach, P+S 11 melee attack.

Animus

{{Category: Template:Far Strike }}[[Category: Template:Far Strike ]]

Theme Forces

• Template:Children of the Dragon. Nephilim Bolt Thrower gains Unyielding in this theme.
• Template:Oracles of Annihilation
• Template:Primal Terrors
• Template:Ravens of War

Thoughts on Nephilim Bolt Thrower

Nephilim Bolt Thrower in a nutshell

The Nephilim Bolt Thrower is a ranged light warbreast with a strong gun. Considering raw power alone, the bolt is the 3rd strongest ranged weapon in the faction behind Azrael and the Blightbringer / Ravagore, on par with the Archangel and the Carnivean. Though it is not an AoE, it has Thunderbolt on it; enabling reliable scenario and threat range / threat vector manipulation the other guns lack. Thanks to Eyeless Sight cloud walls and Stealth offer no protection from it and though its base range is low, the Far Strike animus will allow you to stay at a respectable distance and still pose a threat, or reach the opponent's weaker elements beyond the frontline. While its close combat abilities are mediocre, its Quick Work rule may enable you to use it opportunistically in melee to first clear a jamming model then "leapfrog" a bolt into previously unreachable targets. See its potential use at the end, in Tips and Tricks.

It is not without its drawbacks though - it is among the most expensive lights and has no way of mitigating terrain (fairly atypical in the faction), making it a very niche warbeast for most of the warlocks. However, it feels home under the care of the lesser warlocks, who can form a fully independent fire base with this warbeast under their care.

Combos & Synergies

Non-warlock synergies

• Ravens of War - This theme provides everything the Bolt Thower might need:
  • Lesser warbests hand out Mark Target that can mean the difference between needing to aim, or moving forward and still reliably hitting things.
  • Blighted Nyss Sorceress ensures that if you need to charge in a sturdier single-wound target, you will score a kill upon a successful attack roll to trigger Quick Work. If you want to lean into this trick, consider putting the Neph under the Blight Archon's care for Crimson Ballet to retreat, or stride even deeper into enemy lines.
• Children of the Dragon - The Unyielding bonus is fairly unappealing on that beast, but may become relevant if you failed to kill your intended Quick Work target to stay alive a bit longer.
• Beast Mistress - She can take care of the Fury-output of at least 1 Nephilim all by herself, and Energizer adds 2 to its threat range without needing to sacrifice the aiming bonus (since the advance happens outside the Bolt Thrower's activation). She also likes ranged beast so she can stay safe and avoid getting sniped while the beast gets work done.
  • Shepherd - She can clear off excess Fury, extends the operation area of the beast, and in general, 2 or 3 can form a decent firebase with a single bolt Thrower. The Forsaken would also be able to clear off the entire Fury stock of a Bolt Thrower but usually she's tasked with managing more Fury-intensive beasts like the Ravagore.
• Thagrosh0 - Not only he can herd a Bolt Thrower or two on his own, he can pump up their DEF with Fog of War to basically DEF15 without needing to worry to compromise the Bolt Thrower's accuracy thanks to Eyeless Sight. Also, if you manage to knock down a beast/jack in a Blight Burst template, it will be unable to do much more beyond walking out, since it cannot shake the effect.

Warlocks

• Vayl1, Vayl2 and Saeryn all have weak, utility guns that may enjoy extra range from Far Strike. Just make sure it is the best way to spend your warbeast points (since Far Strike is a Range:Self animus, it must be in their battlegroup to be able to cast is).

All four Lylyths love the Bolt Thrower due to its animus, so much that basically if you run any of them, the Bolt Thrower gets into the list first, even before the warlock.

• Lylyth1 - Lylyth's game plan makes or breaks by connecting her Witch Mark bowshots, and 12" is not an unbeatable range, neither for guns nor for melee. 16" however can provide ample breathing space, while under her feat you have a pretty high chance of rolling a critical hit.
• Lylyth2 - Her entire toolkit is about ranged warfare, so the Bolt Thrower feels home in her list (not necessarily under her control, though).
• Lylyth3 - That is 28" threat range between Trample and Far Strike. Knock Down and the feat's stationary also stacks upon targets, needing 2 Focus / Fury to be able to shake both.
• Lylyth4 - The Bolt Thrower is pretty grateful for Lylyth's entire toolkit: Mortality fixes damage and accuracy, feat fixes both AND adds additional range, Deceleration fixes DEF against guns, while Broadside basically doubles its output for every turn the BT is in range. Arcane Machinery's Run&Gun also allows the Bolt Thrower to operate closer to the enemy lines than it normally does (maybe even spare Fury on its animus). Whatever your order of activation is, you can get job done with Mekanolyth and a Bolt Thrower in every turn.

Drawbacks & Downsides

• One of the few beasts in the faction who has no way of navigating through rough terrain.
• Pretty Fury-intensive; between Far Strike and fully boosting your single attack on a quality gun it maxes out its FURY quite fast.
• Single-shot quality guns are prone to anti-shooting tech, most notably Shield Guard, Sucker, Sacrificial Pawn and more.
• Pitiful melee attack that makes triggering Quick Work difficult.

Tricks & Tips

• Thunderbolt is an incredibly useful ability to manipulate the opponent's movement and scenario. You may always want to look for angles to push your target out of zones and flags, or out of contest ranges from flags. You may also set up vectors for your more valuable guns, like pushing a target in/out of a forest patch so the rest of your guns may have LOS to it. You can also push back an opponent into a hazard, or deeper into the forest so it will have no line of sight out of it next turn. You can also push a hardy shield guards out of their effective range from a valuable target, or just open up charge lane for your brawlers.
• With that in mind, remember that Thunderbolt is not optional; do not push your target out of range of your follow-up attacks.
• Quick Work needs to be resolved immediately, but it won't be triggered if upon destroying a model you are still engaged by another enemy model. Of course, if you charge into a group of stationary/knocked-down models, they cannot engage or be engaged, so a kill will trigger the shot all right.

Other

Trivia

Released in Forces of Hordes: Legion of Everblight (2010)